Contact tracing app weeks away
Monday, 27 April 2020
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eHealthNews.nz editor Rebecca McBeth

A national Covid-19 contact tracing app will be available by mid-May.
However, the Prime Minister remains “sceptical” about the benefits it will deliver because it requires such a large proportion of New Zealanders to download and run it.
Jacinda Ardern said at a press conference on 27 April that while she is enthusiastic about exploring the use of technology to supplement contact tracing, she remains “a bit sceptical around what it’s going to be able to deliver because the uptake has to be so high”.
A Ministry of Health spokesperson says the first version of a contact tracing app will be available in the next couple weeks.
“The app itself is undergoing further development," a Ministry statement says.
“We are working on standards for other app providers including the use of QR codes, so people could check in at businesses or places.”
In the first instance, the new app will allow people to pre-register and update their contact details, to help contact tracers do their work.
The recently released, Rapid Audit of Contact Tracing for Covid-19 in New Zealand, says only 60 percent of contacts traced by National Close Contact Service could be easily reached by phone, partly because of incorrect contact details.
It reveals that the Ministry is working with local developers to build a contact tracing app, which it says needs to be available quickly, piloted and continuously improved.
Key to its success is that is must be acceptable to a large proportion of the population and therefore have high uptake.
“Less than a fifth of the Singaporean population downloaded the TraceTogether app in ten days, which, assuming random mixing, means only 1 in 25 exposures will be captured by the app and public health impact will be negligible,” the audit explains.
The report also reiterates what director general of health Ashley Bloomfield and Ardern have warned previously, that a tracing app is not a “silver bullet” and will not replace manual contact tracing.
“Near instantaneous notification of contacts following case diagnosis is promising from a public health perspective, but other elements of the process of case assessment, testing and notification will still need to be optimised,” the audit says.
Health Minister David Clark has previously told the Epidemic Response Committee that New Zealand was looking at adapting Singapore’s TraceTogether technology to build its own app.
TraceTogether uses Bluetooth to exchange a ‘digital handshake’ if someone comes within a certain distance of another user of the app. These close contacts can be automatically alerted if a user later tests positive for the virus.
Australia has released an app based on this technology called COVIDSafe.
The Australian government says information collected by the app is securely encrypted and stored in the app on the user’s phone, where not even the user can access it. Information is stored for 21 days, then deleted.
A blog written by Otago University public health experts Tim Chambers, Nick Wilson and Michael Baker says there is global consensus that improving contact tracing efficiency and effectiveness is a critical feature of the Covid-19 response
“Because of the need for high speed, good coverage, and interfacing between individuals and health care authorities (who coordinate and monitor contact tracing and testing), while also meeting reasonable privacy standards, digital contact tracing technology is the most demanding to get right,” it says.
“Ultimately, applications should enable users to control their data, collect only data directly related to the problem and when released to health authorities, have strict data-use and destruction procedures.
“Public communication of these privacy and data protection concerns could determine the success or failure of the innovation and our collective COVID-19 response.”
A MoH statement says: “our key focus with the app and the standards is making sure we respect New Zealanders’ privacy and security of information.”
A recent survey from Horizon Research Ltd reveals that 73 per cent of Kiwis questioned, support personal mobile data being used for Covid-19 tracking and only ten percent are strongly opposed.
If you would like to provide feedback on this news story, please contact the editor Rebecca McBeth.
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